Prevention is better than cure
by Selective scifi junkie
Summary: Maybe he should have offered to go downstairs with Anna... 4.3 divergent. I know there are a lot of these (this is my second), but I wrote this trying to cope with what we all saw. 4.3 spoilers, obviously.


Prevention is better than cure

"Babo, pieta, pieta." The singer held the last word for what felt like an impossibly long time, before falling silent and bowing her head as the applause began. John clapped a few times, glancing over his shoulder. Maybe he should have offered to go downstairs with Anna, if she was feeling unwell. He also felt a need to apologize for being sharp with her earlier. Yes, Green made him uncomfortable in a way he couldn't put in to words, but that didn't give him an excuse to be so brusque with his wife. He was probably being over cautious. Most men like that were far too cowardly to ever try anything. Going down now would give him an opportunity to make right with her. He leant over to Mrs. Hughes.

"Do you think anyone will mind if I go and see that Anna's alright?" She shook her head.

"I shouldn't think so. I'll make your excuses if necessary."

"Thank you." He got to his feet and limped towards the door. The singer was starting up again,

"Sah ein Knab ein Röslein stehen,

Röslein auf der Heiden…"

He was at the top of the back stairs when he heard it. A woman's shriek, then the clang of something metal falling on a hard floor. He stopped in his tracks.

"Anna?" He called. He strained his ears. No reply, only a couple of indistinct thumps. He set off again, faster, following the sound. If Anna was in danger, he had to get to her.

Another shriek, of fear or pain, he wasn't sure. He was wary now, breathing quickly, ready for danger, battle. He'd never heard Anna scream like that, but there was an edge to the voice that sounded familiar, that sounded like her. Then a man's voice.

"Lie still, you little bitch!" A thump, then another scream. That was Green's voice. The screaming was definitely Anna now. Green shouting at Anna to lie still while she screamed.

Somehow, John's mind didn't rationalize that. Some part of him remembered war, remembered that surprise is the best weapon in any fight, and took over. He stayed silent, gripping his stick like a bayonet, limping worse for lack of it, advancing as fast as he could. The boot room, that was where the noise was coming from. He could hear Anna's voice, but no words. He opened the door.

John took in what lay before him as though it were being branded on to his eyes. Anna lay flat on the ground, gasping in panic, dress rent from the neck as far down as he could see, the white of her skin stark against the black fabric, one hand scrabbling frantically against the floor, trying to roll over, the other being pulled aside by Green's hand. Green was lying on top of her, his weight pinning one of her legs out to the side, the other was still beneath him somewhere, with Green's other hand.

The next thing John was aware of was Green sprawling to the side, in to the table legs, his own walking stick bouncing back off Green's head. He wanted to hurt him. He wanted to make him suffer. He wanted to kill him. He wanted to kill him for what he'd been doing to Anna. His Anna. His perfect, dear Anna.

"Bastard!" John roared, kicking Green with his bad leg to keep him down while he recoiled the stick. "Get away from her! Get away!" Green drew back under the table. John grabbed it with his free hand and turned it over, scattering brushes and polish. He sent Green sprawling with the stick again. "Don't ever touch her again! Ever!" He kicked Green in the stomach. "Stand up and take it like a man you Bastard!" Other voices were shouting now, not just his.

"Get off me!"

"I will kill you for this!"

"Off!"

"You will never touch her again!"

"John, stop it, stop it!" Green's mouth was bloody, he was still trying to get away, hands scrabbling on the floor like Anna's had. He would pay for this. He would pay for what he'd done to her.

"Get off!" Green kicked out at him, but it was ill-judged. Even though it hit John's bad leg, he barely felt it. "She bloody asked!"

"You will never touch her again!"

"She as-" He kicked the breath out of Green's lungs. Vivid red blood splattered on the floor.

"Stop it! Please John, stop!" He felt hands on his arm. He pushed back against them, they recoiled. He swung the stick in to Green again. Green yelped like a dog and curled up.

"Bastard!"

"John!"

"Leave me a-" John kicked Green sprawling, raised his stick again.

Something was round his neck, pulling back, hard enough that he would have fallen if something hadn't been behind him. He raised a hand to his neck, gasping against the sudden pressure.

"John, stop!" He staggered a pace backwards, feeling the human body behind him move too, swinging at Green again with the stick. "Look at me! Please!" Anna. The person behind him, holding him by the neck, shouting at him was Anna. He could even smell her this close. He turned. She slid her arm back from his neck and crossed it over her body, holding the torn edges of her dress together, bent forwards like an old woman, blood oozing from a cut lip, breath still coming in harsh, tearing sobs. His breathing was no steadier. She met his gaze, visibly shaking. At that sight, the sight of his beautiful, perfect Anna sobbing and bleeding, he might have wept had rage not still held him. "John, what will happen if you kill him? Do you think they'd let you go? You'd hang. You'd hang and you know you would." For a moment, John just stood there, panting, until he was calm enough to think, to understand Anna's words. She stood looking back at him, eyes glazed with tears.

She was right. Of course she was. To do justice on Green would mean death for him. She'd given so much to save him from the rope before. Even if he thought it was worth it, for her sake, he couldn't. He lowered the stick. It felt so wrong to let Green walk away, after what he'd tried to do, he must have been close to succeeding. A soldier would have been tied to a gun wheel for hours on end every day for a month for as much in the Boer War. And Green could walk away, go back to his master's house in the city, live on as though his bruises were from nothing more than a fall, as though he hadn't thrown this blameless, perfect woman to the floor like a misbehaving whelp, then tried to…

Anna took a step back, towards the door, away from him, away from Green.

"Come on." She breathed through a sob. She didn't turn until he'd taken half a pace towards her. As soon as she did, he turned back to Green, bringing his stick round ahead of him, catching Green across the chest.

"Consider yourself very fortunate that my wife is less impulsive than I am." John growled. "I would have killed you. But if you ever lay a single finger on her again, I swear no one will be able to stop me." Green didn't reply, he didn't even look John in the eyes. He just lay there, blood still pooling in the corner of his mouth. He was cowed, and probably hurt. Good.

He turned back to Anna. She was still standing on the threshold, still shaking, still clutching her torn dress about herself. She looked so sad, so defeated. She looked down and started to walk away. She was limping slightly on her left leg. He had no idea where she was going, just followed her, listening to her attempts to steady her breathing, with no idea what he could say to her.

Anna opened the door to Mrs. Hughes's office and let herself in, still shaking, still sobbing quietly. There was a chair by the desk, but she ignored it, retreating to the shadow behind the dresser and lowering herself to the floor. She curled forwards, hiding her face between one hand and one knee, the other hand still clutching at her dress, hiding like a chastened child, as though by hiding her eyes, she could make herself invisible.

"Anna," He said quietly. She didn't respond. He stepped closer. He had no idea what to say to her, what to do. "Anna," She still didn't respond. He was afraid to get too close to her, when every fiber of her body seemed to be crying out for solitude, but he couldn't bear to see her curled up like that, so desolate, so alone. He couldn't bear for her to push him away. He took two more steps towards her. Still no response. He laid a hand on her arm, just above her elbow. Her breath caught. She released the torn edges of her dress and took his hand in hers, her eyes on his hand, not his face. He pulled her off the floor, in to his arms. She let out a stifled squeak of pain – was it? He released her at once, her crying redoubled.

"Anna-"

"I'm s-sorry." There was a long silence.

"I'll get some saltwater for your head. Even the smallest cuts heal better for being clean." He needed to be by her side, but he couldn't bear the sight of her like this, bruised, bleeding, hair half torn out of its bun, eyes red-rimmed. She suddenly looked twenty years older, as though twenty years worth of burden had been thrown on to her back.

The kitchen was dark, but he knew where Mrs. Patmore kept the salt after this many years. A minute later, a small enamel dish full of brine and a cloth in his left hand, he left the kitchen. The boot room door swung open to his left. He turned, grasping his stick like a bayonet again. No one emerged; Green had probably already slunk off to lick his wounds. If he was going to exact vengeance on Green, he had to do it out of Anna's hearing. He released the breath he hadn't realized he'd been holding. He needed to be with Anna now.

She hadn't moved, unsurprisingly. She flicked her eyes up to him as he opened the door, tensing, afraid he was Green, then looked back down, still gasping for tears. He crouched down beside her, set down the bowl and cloth, then lowered himself the last few inches. Getting up again would be a challenge. It didn't matter. He laid a hand on Anna's brow and tilted her head back, the better to look at the cut on her cheekbone. She didn't resist him, even as he applied the stinging liquid to her bleeding skin. She just sat there, sobbing, tendons jerking out from her neck with every breath. He left the cut on her lip to look at her hands. Both were chaffed badly. He took the nearer, her right in his and pulled it towards him. Again, she didn't resist. She arched her body away as he ran saltwater over the cuts, whimpering in pain once or twice, but didn't pull her hand back.

"I know it hurts, Anna." He said softly. "This way, at least, they'll heal cleanly." She nodded once, biting her lip, her sobs reduced to occasional sips of air and shaking breath now. There was a long silence. He released her right hand and put his own hand out for her left. She gave it to him silently. Neither of them said anything else, what could he say? Until Anna gasped.

"I'm sorry, Anna. I-"

"John," She cut him off, looking in to his eyes for the first time since he'd brought the brine. "You – you have to believe me. I n-never wanted him to – I never wanted anything." For a moment he just stared at her.

"Anna, how could you think that I would think-? You were screaming. You were screaming fit to tear your throat in two." He shook his head. "I know what he was trying to do to you. A part of me is sorry that you stopped me, in spite of what I would have paid for killing the Blackguard." Anna sobbed once more, looking down again.

"That's why I had to do it, stop you. Do you see that?" He nodded.

"Yes, my love, I do." She winced and sobbed as though he'd struck out at her. They were silent a moment. "Where else are you hurt?" She fought to get her breathing under control for a moment.

"Mostly it's bruises, apart from that, I think."

"Mostly." He repeated. Anna nodded.

"My leg…" She tailed off.

"Show me." She hesitated. "Anna, I've seen. You don't have to hide from me. I know what you look like." Maybe that had been too far, maybe that was too close to what Green had been doing, maybe her need for… liberty, privacy outranked her need to heal physically. She obeyed him though, lifting her skirt and turning her head away, biting her lip, showing him the long, raked, bloody graze on the inside of her left leg, a long way above the knee. John bit the inside of his mouth. That was not a mark from any fight, any beating. That was a mark she'd got from Green's shoe, maybe, something in his pocket, trying to keep him out of her. John closed his eyes as he wet the cloth again. He would kill Green for this. Somehow, he would make him pay.


End file.
